THEY "STOOP TO CONQUER;" OR, THE ENGLISH SWINDLE. 



SPEECH 



\ 



SENATOR WADE, OF OHIO. 




Delivered in the United States Senate, April 27, 1858. 



Mr. President : It is not my purpose 
at this tiuie, after the general question 
has heen so ehaborately discussed, to do- 
tain the Senate at any length by any- 
tliing that I may have to say at this pe- 
riod of the debate. But, sir, we have 
now before us, as we are told, a new 
proposition altogether. We are told that 
it is in the nature of a new bill, having 
but very little connection with anything 
that has preceded it. I must confess 
that I am astonished at the nature of the 
proposition which the gentlemen com- 
posing the committee of conference have 
brought in for our consideration. Un- 
trammelled as the committee seem to have 
been by anything that has been done — 
so they say — and being about to initiate 
a new proposition altogether, the fact 
that their minds should have fastened 
upon such a thing as this, is well calcu- 
lated, I think, to surprise anybody. If 
justice, right, and equal regard to the 
institutions of the South and of the 
North, were to be considered by that 
committee, it appears to me that an un- 
sophisticated man might, in five minutes, 
have brought in a proposition against 
which there would have been no dissent- 
ing voice in either branch of your Legis- 
lature. 

We had been divided here upon ques- 
tions with regard to the will and wishes 
of the people of Kansas as to the Con- 
stitution under which they should live. 
It was contended on the one side that 



the people, acting through the forms of 
law, had framed a Constitution which 
ought to be obligatory. On the other 
hand, that Constitution was assailed here 
by the Opposition, upon the ground that 
it was an utter perversion of the will of 
the majority of the people of Kansas ; 
that it was got up by trickery and by 
fraud, and that the majority of the peo- 
ple ought not to be governed by it. Thus 
we were at issue upon this thing called thf- 
Lecompton Constitution. A portion of 
the people had called a Convention, which 
framed this instrument, and called it a 
Constitution. The people had previouslv 
met and framed another Constitution 
which they called their Constitution, and 
which they said embodied the will of thf 
great mass of the people of Kansas, i 
allude to the Topeka Constitution. 

Now, sir, when this committee were 
about to pass by all the propositions that 
had gone before, and to substitute a new 
bill, how easy it would have been for 
them to say, in perfect justice and fair- 
ness to all, " we will not take the first 
Constitution made at Topeka, because it 
is denied on the other side to be the will of 
the people ; we will not take the Lecomp- 
ton Constitution, because it is alleged to 
be fraudulent, and not to embody tli< 
will of the people; but we will throv 
both aside, and we will provide, under 
every safeguard that can secure an hon- 
est and fair election, for submitting this 
complicated and vexatious question agaii; 



to the people, and they shall be at lib- 
erty to frame their Constitution." For 
that purpose the committee might have 
selected any precedent they wished — 
they mij^dit have taken the enabling act 
for Minnesota, or any similar one, and 
they would have found no objection to it. 
We should all have voted for a proposi- 
tion of that kind, just to all parties ; we 
should have permitted the people to come 
up now fairly to the work of framing a 
Constitution ; we should have said to 
them, " make it republican in form ; sub- 
mit it to our consideration ; and if we 
find it to be such, we will admit you with 
it." 

Why did it not occur to this commit- 
tee that that was the way to settle the 
controversy, if a settlement of it was in- 
deed desired? The proposition which 
they have made, while it seems to me in 
a certain aspect to be humiliating to the 
South, is unjust, if not an open insult, to 
the North. It is humiliating to the South 
because it is a total and entire abandon- 
ment of the principle on which many of 
them staked their determination not to 
exist in the Union at all ; for they said, 
*'let us have the Lecompton Constitu- 
tion, or we will go out of the Union our- 
selves." Tj^at proposition they have 
surrendered ; they have given it up ; they 
do not pretend that they can stand by it, 
unless it is in some sort submitted and 
thrown back to the people to pass upon. 
So far it is right; so far it is just ; and 
I was glad to see the committee yield 
thus for to the reasons and arguments 
which had been addressed to them, show- 
ing that their Lecompton concern was 
fraudulent ; that it did not embody the 
will of the people ; that it was a fraud ; 
and that their legal position was fraught 
with tyranny and danger in all subse- 
quent time. That position has been re- 
pudiated and abandoned by them. We 
hear no more of the omnipotence of Con- 
ventions assembled to frame Constitu- 
tions. We hear no more of their being 
armed with supreme power to put upon 
the necks of a people just such a Con- 
stitution as they please, without the peo- 
ple having power to get rid of it. That 
was the position we heard rung in our 



ears from Southern gentlemen day after 
day, but a little while ago. Now they 
have thrown this absurd position to the 
winds, and I thank God for it. They 
seem to admit that the people, after all, 
must have the right, in some shape, to 
pass upon the institutions under which 
they are to live. So far, it is a great im- 
provement on the Lecompton concern. 
But if the people are to pass upon the 
Lecompton Constitution, why not let 
them do it directly ? Will any man be 
deceived by the verbiage in which this 
proposition is couched? Have you not 
left the people to pass upon it? If so, 
why not submit it in such a plain and 
fair manner that the people can all un- 
derstand it? 

Sir, this proposition reads upon its 
face as though it was a premium for votes. 
Are the people to vote directly upon the 
Constitution under which they live ? Not 
by any means ; but they are to vote 
upon a grant of land ; they are to vote 
whether they will accept a gift from the 
Government of five or six million acres 
of land ; and if they decide to take the 
land, that decision is to drag after it the 
Lecompton Constitution, that the}" have 
repudiated over and over again. Was 
ever any such thing as this concocted 
by a statesman, for the action of the 
people? Is. a land grant the princi- 
pal thing in framing a State Consti- 
tution? Sir, it seems to be a bid 
of land for liberty, a bribe held out. 
" V\ ill you, people of Kansas, surrender 
your liberties for land? " That is the 
question ; it cannot be disguised. I im- 
pugn directly the motives of no man, but 
I state what the efiect of this action will 
be. How will it appear to the world, 
say what you will about it ? If the peo- 
ple will vote themselves so much land^ 
then they surrender themselves to a slave 
Constitution, which you and I know they 
have repudiated over and over again. It 
is not competent for me to state the mo- 
tives which have prompted to such ac- 
tion as this ; but you vote for the inci- 
dent, and the principal is to follow. 
How absurd and inconsequential ! Why, 
Mr. President, if I should make just 
such a proposition as that, to obtain your 



vote upon a private bill, and it should 
come out to the worhl that I had done it, 
I presume every just-minded Senator 
here woukl vote promptly to expel me 
from the body, as unworthy of a seat in it. 
The offer is : " So much land if you vote 
» for this Constitution ; if you vote against 

^ it, you shall have neither land nor any- 
thing else." 

^ Mr. President, I recollect well that in 

^ the course of some observations which I 
made not long ago, you, sir, [Mr. Biggs 

i in the chair,] put the question to me : 

%, Suppose a slave Constitution were pre- 
sented to Congress, would I vote for it? 

22 I recollect well the answer I made to 
you, and 3'our apparent surprise at the 

- absurdity of the answer. Yet I find the 
President of this body to-day assuming 
my position, and voting for the same 
proposition, only reversing its applica- 
tion. I would not vote for the admis- 
sion of a slave Constitution ; nor will 
you vote for a free one. I do not com- 
plain of you ; I cannot complain of )'ou, 
because I occupy about the same ground 
that you will do an hour hence, when 
the vote is taken, except that practically 
our positions are reversed in the appli- 
cation of them. You come from a slave 
State, and I from a free State. The 
countr)'' will understand the positions we 
all occupy on this subject, and J do not 
care how soon they are understood by 
all. 

Mr. President, it has been sought to 
break the force of the objections to this 
scheme by saying that there was uncer- 
tainty about the people of Kansas ac- 
cepting the grant proposed in your 
original bill. This is a strange apology, 
and it comes at a strange and an unfor- 
tunate time. Sir, do you not know that 
the subject was mooted in the Committee 
on Territories, and it was said that no 
kind of objection could arise from any 
sucii thing ; that we had a right to modi- 
fy the ordinance, and make what grant 
of land we pleased to the Territory ; and 
if they rejected the Constitution on ac- 
count of our not giving them as mucli 
as they thought they were entitled 
to, they would not be a State ; but if 
they accepted the Constitution by or- 



ganizing under it, subject to the pro- 
vision wc had made, that was an end of 
it 7 How happens it now that you make 
this whole controversy turn, as it were, 
on the uncertainty whether the people 
will accept a donation such as you have 
made to every other State 1 Why in the 
name of Heaven is it now paraded here 
as the main reason why you have re- 
versed your action ? 

Mr. Green. The Committee on Ter- 
ritories never did say that it was the 
right of the committee or of Congress to 
dictate the terms upon which the State 
should be admitted. They have always 
claimed that ; but on the question of 
contract on the subject of lands, it was 
matter of agreement. The foi'mation 
and adoption of a Constitution, the com- 
mittee held, was a question with which 
the Senate and House of Representatives 
had nothing to do ; and that has been 
the point all the time. I think, there- 
fore, the Senator does injustice to the 
committee when he says that they thought 
the subject of the grant of lands was a 
proper matter for the consideration of 
the Convention of the Territory. Not 
so ; it is a matter of agreement, propo- 
sition, acceptance ; but the Constitution 
is a different thing; that is a finality 
alread}^ 

Mr. Wade. I do not deny that. 
That is just exactly what we did agree. 
We agreed that it was a proposed com- 
pact, and that if the proposition on our 
part should be accepted by the organiza- 
tion of a State Government under it, it 
would be very well, and their action un- 
der it would show their agreement to our 
projiosed contract. That is what we 
agreed to in committee, and it is a sound 
principle of law ; and the idea of repu- 
diating it is not twenty-four hours old. 
That is how we agreed ; and yet the 
Senator from Virginia rises here, and, to 
apologize for this misshapen production of 
the committee of conference, makes it all 
to turn on the uncertainty of whether the 
people of Kansas would accept this prop- 
osition. I might ask that Senator, or 
any other who has had anything to do 
with this subject, if that matter labored 
in your mind, how in the name of Heaven 



did you suffer your Lecompton bill to be 
[abated here day after day, -week after 
«veek, and I do not know but I might 
ay month after month, without suggest- 
ng the great difficulty which must inter- 
rupt the whole proceedings, and lead 
you to surrender all you had done, and 
6et up a scheme entirely new 1 You did 
not apprehend any such thing, as you 
went on with your Lecompton bill. The 
Senator from Virginia never suggested 
then that there was any trouble about 
:he land grants that were provided for 
in that bill. You voted .it through this 
body. It ran as smooth as oil. No 
man said there was any difficulty about 
that, nor could it be said ; because so 
far as the ordinance was concerned, and 
the land grant was involved, the bill 
stood on exactly the same principles as 
every other Territorial bill, and granted 
iio more, no less. Why, then, seek to 
cover up this enormity under so plain a 
proposition as that? Sir, the people 
will understand it, whether gentlemen 
here will understand it or not. It is in 
the nature of a bribe. It is not expected 
that the unsophisticated people, through 
the whole wilderness of Kansas, will be 
able, like lawyers, to scan closely, and 
understand critically, the import of this 
grant. I will not say that the fact that 
it was known they would not understand 
it, constituted the reason why a question 
so simple as the adoption or the rejection 
(if the Lecompton Constitution is made 
to turn on the fact whether the people 
will accept a donation of lands ; but it 
^oks very much like it. It would be 
jut of order for me to say it was so in- 
tended ; but that will be its effect. 

Well, sir, that is the nature of the 
proposition. I have said it is humilia- 
ting to the high-minded South, because 
it is a total surrender of the position 
upon which they planted themselves, and 
swore in their councils they would stake 
their institutions. You have given it up ; 
you have surrendered Lecompton, in this 
miserable way to be sure, into the hands 
of the people of Kansas, to reject it if 
J-hey please, and as I trust in God they 
*-hey will. Therein, sir, you lie in the 
dust. Southern chivalry is here in these 



Halls, begging men to vote for a misera- 
ble proposition, well calculated to mis- 
lead the people. I am sorry for it. 1 
have respected their highmindedness. I 
have always hoped heretofore that they 
were above consenting to arrangements 
that could not stand out in open day. 1 
do not say that anything sinister is in- 
tended in this proposition, but I know it 
is well calculated in itself to deceive the 
people, and therefore I pronounce it hu- 
miliating to the South. I say, further, 
it is unjust, if not an open insult, to the 
North. Why? I can tell you nothing 
new, after the proposition has been so 
ably handled by the honorable Senator 
from Kentucky and the honorable Sen- 
ator from Vermont, who have preceded 
me. They have made it too palpably 
plain for me to stand here long in elab- 
orating this point. Here stands out be- 
fore the whole world the most glaring 
injustice, the most palpable wrong; and 
no man dare face me down here, and say 
that you place Slavery and Liberty upon 
equal foundations by this measure. You 
talk of the equality of the States. W' hy, 
sir, you are trampling the free States 
into the dust, and offering bribes to Sla- 
very. It will not do. Whether we un- 
derstand it or not, God knows the people 
of the United States, the honest people, 
will understand it. 

I have said, and I still say, that this 
proposition is flagrantly unjust to the 
North, and, I think, an open insult. 
Well might the Senator from Kentucky 
ask, what would the South think of a 
proposition like this on the other side ? 
I have too good an opinion of you to be- 
lieve that you would bear it as meekly 
as we shall. I believe that you would 
conduct yourselves, in reference to such 
a nefarious proposition, in a manner more 
fraught with honor to your section than 
I fear we shall. I wish to God we had 
men as fearless to stand up for the right, 
as you have to stand up for the wrong. 
I honor you for the manner in which you 
stand up to what you say you regard as 
your rights. Well might the Senator 
from Kentucky ask, what would you 
think of such a proposition, if the case 
were reversed ? There is not a Southern 



man who -will not die in his trades before 
he would surrender to a proposition so 
insulting to the South as this manifestly 
is to the North. I know you would not, 
and I give you all honor for it, because in 
that, if in nothing else, God knows I sym- 
pathize with you ; you are right in it. 

The proposition now offered to the 
people of Kansas is this : " You shall 
have six million acres of land, and im- 
mediate admission into the Union, if you 
will take Slavery ; but if you prefer a 
free State, you shall be excluded ; you 
shall be treated as outside barbarians, 
unworthy to be members of this Union 
for an indefinite length of time to come." 
It is undeniable ; it stands out gross, 
palpable, upon the face of j'our record, 
and cannot be disguised. It required a 
good deal of assurance, a good deal of 
eff'rontery, to bring in a proposition like 
this ; but you knew the material to which 
you were addressing it too well to fear 
the consequences. You say by this prop- 
osition, if Congress adopts it, " Come in, 
ye people of Kansas ; here are millions 
of acres of land ; here is immediate ad- 
mission if you prefer Slavery; but if, on 
the other hand, you prefer Liberty, you 
are unworthy of admission, you are not 
numerous enough to be admitted." One 
slaveholder, for the purpose of the admis- 
sion of a Territory as a State .is worth 
more than twenty free men. '"'hat is the 
naked proposition which you have brought 
here for the consideration of Northern 
men, and I pei'ceive that you will have 
Northern men who will go with you even 
for this. You will have them, and you 
knew you would ; because you knew you 
could not make a proposition, however 
fatal to the rights, however fatal to the 
honor of the North, without finding here 
men who would stoop to it. When I 
contrast the high chivalric honor of the 
South in this particular with the North, 
I sometimes wish to change places with 
them. Here is a proposition offering a 
premium to Slavery, and immediate ad- 
mission without inquiry as to the num- 
bers, if the people of Kansas will come 
here as a slave State ; but if they decide 
on the side of Freedom, they are to be 
indefinitely postponed until a census shall 



be taken at the will of a craven and be- 
sotted Executive. That is the proposi- 
tion offered to the high-minded people of 
that section from which I come. They 
will spurn it, though I perceive that some 
of their Representatives are about to 
take it. 

Now, what are to be the consequences 
of the passage of this proposition? I 
must judge from what has preceded it. 
I do not know but that I may be unchar- 
itable in my supposition ; but when I 
look at your candle-box frauds, at your 
Cincinnati Dirc-ctory frauds, all adopted 
by your Executive, and the agents who 
commit the frauds applauded and foisted 
into high offices of power and respecta- 
bility, how can I repose confidence in 
youl When I see the just arrangement 
which had been made by that just man, 
the lover of equality and justice to all 
parties and to all sections, the Senator 
from Kentucky, stricken out, and an- 
other man added to the board to super- 
vise the election — a man who was no 
more wanted there than a fifth wheel to a 
coach, for jon had a full board before — I 
ask this committee, and I wish them to 
answer me now, why did you place the 
district attorney of the Territory on that 
board of commissioners'? I repeat the 
question, why did you do it? Was it 
not right before ? A corrupt Executive 
was allowed to appoint tAvo. Was it 
wrong that the people should appoint two 
more? Why give your Executive the 
appointment of a majority of the board, 
and full power over tlie people, to trample 
them in the dust? Answer me that, if 
you can ! I pause, but I pause in vain, 
for a reply. What shall I say, then? 
Sir, it savors too much of the candle-box 
and of the Cincinnati Directory. Is it 
intended, at all hazards, against the vote 
of the people, and in defiance of their 
wishes, to forge a majority, to make a 
false return to the President that you 
have outvoted the Free-State men, and 
that Lecompton is adopted? Was that 
the anchor you had thrown to the wind- 
ward, in giving a complete majority to 
your own party in that board, and not 
trusting the people on equal terms with 
the Executive? 



6 



Sir, I have no fears of the people of 
Kansas if 3'ou give them any chance, 
even if you ■will be honest in counting 
their votes ; bat here the matter is left 
to the President of the United States, 
■who censured his Governor because he 
had refused to yield to an outrageous, 
notorious, palpable, undisputed fraud, 
and ultimately compelled him to resign. 
I say, when such things are done, ■what 
may we not suspect 1 I can hardly real- 
ize that I am in the Senate of the United 
States, ■when propositions calculated to 
blind the people, propositions calculated 
to hold out false colors, are presented in 
this way. In this scheme, you have evi- 
dently folloAved, as far as you could, the 
bill presented by the Senator from Ken- 
tucky ; but you have amended that most 
just chiuse of his, upon which the hon- 
esty of the whole transaction turned, in 
order that you might still keep in the 
hands of those who have proved them- 
selves to be unworthy of such a trust, 
the power to decide against the people, 
as tliey have done heretofore, the fate of 
the new State. 

Now, sir, I am not so much of an enemy 
to the people of the South as they sup- 
pose. I think they will never gain any- 
thing by such a proposition as this. It 
is not because I suppose they will, that 
I manifest this zeal against it ; but be- 
cause, like the Senator from Kentucky, 
I know that the safety, the permanency, 
the true glory of our institutions, must 
be built upon the solid foundations of 
eternal right and justice ; and this trick- 
ery, these frauds, although they may 
serve the purpose of a party for a day, 
are fraught with danger to the whole 
community, and will finally result in dis- 
astrous consequences, even to those for 
whose benefit they seem to be perpetra- 
ted. 

Mr. President, I have now said all 
that I intended to say, and much more, 
because when I see a proposition that 
appears to be unfair, and, I will say, 
that appears to be dishonest, I cannot 
retain exactly that equanimity that per- 
haps I ought. It may be all fair and all 
right, but I must announce the imprcs- 
bions that I deliberately have on that 



subject. I think it is palpably wrong—' 
wrong to the high-minded people of the 
South, who, I am sure, when they under- 
stand it, will trample it beneath their 
feet as an unclean thing — unjust, pal- 
pably unjust, to the North, whom it 
|)hices on a footing of inequality. Sir, 
if I did seek the destruction of the insti- 
tutions of the South, I could devise no 
way more facile than that you have your- 
selves marked out ; for, being in the mi- 
nority, whenever you shall liave divested 
3'ourselves of that character which wc« 
have conceded to you — that you are high- 
minded, honorable men — you will have 
lost the great stake in the Government 
that would ever enable you, as long as 
you practiced on these principles, to en- 
joy your full share in the councils of this 
nation, and even more. As I said, I do 
not know but that this proposition may 
be right ; but its appearance is absolutely 
and deliberately wrong. 

Now, Mr. President, I regret that 
such a proposition should have been 
brought in here. Why would you not 
let Leeompton die, if you had not the 
force to put it through ? I would infi- 
nitely prefer, for the honor of the nation, 
both North and South, that you had the 
force in both branches to put your 
Leeompton Constitution through here, 
rather than have been compelled to re- 
sort to this indirection, in order to ac- 
complish the same result ; because its 
effect in demoralizing the nation, per- 
verse and iniquitous as I think it was, 
would have been infinitely less than by 
this mons'ter of a proposition. 

But I have said that it was no part of 
my purpose to detain tlie Senate. I 
have very feebly expressed the feelings 
that I entertain in regard to this propo- 
sition. I do not believe you can seduce 
the noble-minded people of Kansas*, who 
have withstood all your persecutions so 
long, to succumb to such a scheme as 
this. You have exercised the whole 
powers of your Government ; you have 
invoked your armies, and let them loose 
upon the defenceless people there ; you 
have inflicted upon them hardships, and 
pursued them with a relentless persecu- 
tion that I have never known before, and 



I 



hardly ever read of in history ; and yet 
they stand unconquered and unconquer- 
able. It only remains to determine" 
■whether appliances to their cupidity, 
arts of deception, can work out a fall for 
a people who have so nobly withstood all 
your force. I know well you cannot 
force them to it. Their intelligence is 
great, and I think they will be capable 
of seeing through this nefarious net, 
which is calculated to lower them, to 
degrade them, to a condition of servitude. 
I do not believe you will effect it. I have 
a better opinion of those noble spirits. I 
think the controversy will result in your 
most ignominious defeat before the peo- 
ple of Kansas. The only danger I ap- 
prehend is from the arrangement of this 
scheme by which you put the whole 



power of controlling the election into the 
hands of a corrupt Executive. The 
people are against you in overwhelming 
numbers. The only doubt is, whether 
the executive officers aviII count their 
votes aright. I am willing to venture 
that people, Avith all the skill in weaving 
nets for their destruction that you can 
devise, provided at last you leave them 
to be counted according to their num- 
bers, and make fair, and not John Cal- 
houn, returns. 

Mr. President, I have no fears for the 
result of this measure. The noble- 
hearted, brave, and liberty-loving people 
of Kansas will spurn the infamous prop- 
osition, as the Saviour of the world did 
one in all respects similar in principle, 
and emanating from a like source. 



016 094 455 9 



WASHINGTON, D. C. 

BUELL & BLANCHARD,^ PRINTERS. 
1858. 



